The Second
World War was an international conflict which took place between 1
September
1939 and 2 September 1945. The war was the costliest conflict in human history
and directly involved the majority of nations on the planet. The war
brought about dramatic technological and sociological changes to the
world, including Canada. In total, it is estimated that 62,000,000
people died as a result of the Second World War.

Designation

The term used
by official histories of the war in Canada is "Second World War", though
use of the term "World War II" is also widely accepted. The latter term
is used by American publishers and historians. While
speculative works of fiction and non-fiction used the term Second World
War in the 1930s, the first official use of the term was in September 1939 and
the opening of hostilities between Germany, France and the United
Kingdom. For example, the 3 September 1939 issue of the Calgary Herald used
the term on the front page. Official histories of British and Canadian
participation in the war use the term "Second World War" almost
exclusively.1

Canadian Army Participation

The Canadian Army
participated directly in several major battles/campaigns, chiefly:

Italian dictator Benito Mussolini,
German General Alfred Jodl, German dictator Adolf Hitler, and German
General Wilhelm Keitel. Mussolini was executed in early 1945, Hitler
committed suicide in April 1945, and both Jodl and Keitel were tried at
Nuremberg and hanged in 1946 as war criminals.

Causes

The Second
World War began directly as a result of Germany's invasion of Poland on 1
September 1939. Canada mobilized the Canadian Active Service Force the same day.
Britain and France, who had given diplomatic guarantees to Poland before
the war, declared war on Germany on 3 September 1939. Canada, who had been given
the right to determine its own foreign policy by the Statute of
Westminster, debated its own declaration of war in Parliament, finally
electing to declare war on Germany on 10 September 1939. The war was not viewed
as a surprise, and in fact units of the Canadian Army had been called out
on 25 August 1939 to guard vital installations throughout Canada as a
precursor to a general mobilization.

The roots of
the conflict lay in the conclusion of the First World War in 1918, when
the Treaty of Versailles laid the blame for that war on Germany and forced
that nation to pay harsh reparations to the powers that defeated them,
including Great Britain, France, the United States, and Canada. Severe
political turmoil in Germany in the aftermath of the war, followed by a
world wide economic depression, led to the rise of the Nazis. Similarly, a
fascist government rose in Italy under Mussolini (self-styled as Il Duce)
which provided a model for Germany's leader (self-styled as der Führer),
Adolf Hitler. Both the Italians and the Germans made increasingly
imperialistic moves during the 1930s, building large militaries and
acquiring new territories through use, or threat, of armed force. Japan
also embarked on an imperialist course, beginning in 1931 with an invasion
of Manchuria.

The Axis

An official
alliance between Germany and Italy was formalized in May 1939, and in
September
1940 Japan signed the Tripartite Pact. Germany and Italy's relationship
had been likened to an "axis" around which the rest of the world would
revolve, and the term "The Axis" became widely used to describe Canada's
enemies. The Axis would later include Hungary (November 1940), Romania (November
1940), Slovakia (November 1940) and Bulgaria (March 1941). From a Canadian
perspective, Finland was also a member of the Axis, though the Finns
themselves described themselves as "co-belligerents".

As the war progressed,
alliances and allegiances shifted. After the fall of France, a puppet
state called Vichy France was set up as an ally of Germany and Italy,
including overseas possessions in South America, Africa, and Asia. The
Soviet Union, who had signed a non-aggression pact with Germany in 1939
and had helped occupy Poland in 1939, was invaded by Germany on 22 June
1941, becoming the largest and most important of the Allied nations. The
Japanese attack on the United States in December 1941 resulted in Hitler
declaring war on the United States, though the US had been unofficially
aiding enemies of Japan, Germany and Italy for some time.

Preparedness

None of the
combatant nations that waged war from 1939-1945 were prepared for their
part in the conflict, including, contrary to the mythology built up in the
post-war era, Germany. On 1 September 1939, 90% of German tanks were already
obsolete, armed only with machine guns or 20mm cannon with armour
vulnerable to enemy anti-tank weapons. Half-tracked vehicles for the
mechanized infantry (Schützen Regimenter) of the German armoured divisions
would remain in short supply throughout the war, with as few as 20% of
infantry-carrying vehicles having cross country abilities to permit them
to keep pace with the tanks. The 100,000 man German Army of 1933 had
expanded to 1.5 million men under arms in 1939 with large shortages of
reservists and instructors for those reservists. "Divisional troops" -
those that would support the infantry and armoured units, including
artillery, engineers, railway, transport and signals troops, had not been
part of the Army's makeup in 1933. General Westphal recorded after the war
that "The development of these forces was only in its infancy when war
broke out, and as it could not be properly completed during the war, the
German Army suffered serious deficiencies in these specialized forces
right up to 1945." Motorized equipment and mechanical transport would
likewise be a concern to the German Army, which remained largely
horse-drawn until 1945. In 1939, the German Army had 445,500 horses
serving in the 86 non-motorized infantry divisions. While 1,400,000 horses
served in the German forces in the First World War, that number would be
2,700,000 in the Second.2

The other major
powers - Britain, France, Poland and later the Soviet Union and the United
States - were also largely unprepared for war, modern or otherwise.
Canada's forces were pitiful, with only three severely under strength
infantry battalions serving full time, with 16 tanks for a mechanized
force and horsed cavalry units still on the rolls in 1939.

The United
States was similar to Germany in having a small but professional force of
175,000 men expand to 1.4 million, though this change occurred from 1
September
1939 to the summer of 1940, after conscription was introduced. All the
major militaries of the war would make use of conscription, including
Canada, by the time the war ended.

Events

In 1931, Adolf
Hitler gained political power in Germany, and in 1933 declared himself
Führer, granting himself supreme dictatorial powers. He embarked on a
sweeping series of reforms. These reforms included domestic policies such
as the reduction of unemployment and an increase in the standard of
living, but also with brutal racial policies meant to expunge Jewish
persons (not only those who practiced the Jewish religion but also those
defined as "racially Jewish") from all aspects of German social life. His
reforms also included an aggressive foreign policy, including
remilitarization and reclamation of lands formerly ceded to other nations.
He reoccupied the Rhineland, incorporated Austria into the German nation,
and occupied Czechoslovakia. His attempt to justify the invasion of Poland
by claiming land claims on the port of Danzig were not accepted by Britain
and France, who declared war on Germany. Canada also declared war on 10
September 1939.

Japanese
military forces were involved in aggressive acts in Manchuria as early as
1931, and the rise of a militarist government led to further conflicts, in
China as well as with the United States. Japan's lack of domestic natural
resources was one reason for an expansionist policy in the Pacific.
Conflict in China widened in 1937 as the Second Sino-Japanese War erupted
on 7 July. Japanese occupation of China involved the widespread murder of
civilians.

German tanks demonstrate
their mobility before the war.

The Polish
campaign lasted only a few weeks, with Poland being divided between
Germany (who established a Government General and embarked on a systematic
purge of Jews and intelligentsia) and the Soviet Union (who also purged
intelligentsia, notably in the famous Katyn Massacre). Contrary to popular
belief, German strategy in the campaign was conventional and conservative,
though the media in Allied countries coined the phrase 'Blitzkrieg' and
began speaking of sophisticated tactics used by well coordinated armour,
infantry, artillery and airpower, something the Germans didn't really
accomplish until 1941.

The immediate
impact on the Canadian Army was to finalize the mechanization of the
military (the Royal Canadian Army Veterinary Corps was disbanded in 1940,
and the Canadian Armoured Corps was established).

The Phony War
(or Sitzkrieg, a play on the word "Blitzkrieg") then set in and no major
fighting took part between German and Allied forces until April of 1940
when Germany took Denmark (in one day) and Norway (after costly fighting
with British and Norwegian forces. Some limited naval engagements were
fought during this period and minor skirmishes on the French-German
border. A major conflict between the Soviet Union and Finland was fought,
known as the "Winter War", between November 1939 and March 1940, which saw
Finland cede territory to the USSR.

Canada's
government had desired to keep participation in the military sphere
limited, and only two divisions had been raised. The 1st Canadian Infantry
Division went to the United Kingdom in December 1939, and the government held
off on sending the 2nd Canadian Infantry Division. The spectre of heavy
losses and another conscription debate, as had occurred in the First World
War, was unappealing to the Canadian government.

Fall of France

The invasion of
Denmark and Norway in April 1940 saw more German victories; Denmark
surrendered peacefully and Allied forces in Norway suffered a major defeat
in the space of a few weeks. In the meantime, on 10 May 1940, France and
the Low Countries were invaded. Canada belatedly sent the 1st Infantry
Canadian Division to France in June 1940, by which time German forces had
overrun all of Belgium, The Netherlands, and northern France, and the main
British force on the Continent had already been withdrawn through Dunkirk.
France formally surrendered in June 1940. The 2nd Canadian Infantry
Division was hastily concentrated that summer and began arriving in
England in August 1940 just as the Battle of Britain was beginning. German
aerial forces failed to neutralize the Royal Air Force, a necessary
precursor to invasion, and German plans to conquer England went
unfulfilled. A 3rd Canadian Infantry Division was mobilized in May 1940,
two weeks after the German invasion.

Attention
turned to both the air and naval campaigns. A handful of small raids by
RAF units on German cities in 1939-1940 as a reprisal for bombings of
British cities would grow over the course of the year to become a
component of the Combined Bomber Offensive, in which both British and
American heavy bombers would devastate German industry and cities. Canada
would participate not only with thousands of trained aircrew but also by
playing host to the British Commonwealth Air Training Plan where thousands
of men were trained in Canada to man fighters, bombers and transport
aircraft. In 1945, Canada would boast the world's fourth largest air
force. At sea, the war waged by German submariners was a constant threat
to the survival of the British nation, and Canadian participation in the
Battle of the Atlantic was impressive; at war's end Canada's navy was the
third largest in the world.

1940-41

Continuing its expansionist policies which started in the 1930s with
their invasion of Somalia, Italy invaded southern France at the tail
end of the German campaign there in June 1940, and then invaded
Greece in October 1940, operating from bases in Albania. The attack
failed and Greece managed to gain territory in Albania as a
consequence. Italy also invaded Egypt in 1940, fighting from bases
in Libya. British and Commonwealth troops intervened in both Greece
and North Africa, and German forces went to both theatres to assist
the Italians in 1941. Greece and Crete fell in 1941, and Yugoslavia
fell to a German invasion in the spring of 1941.

The year
1940 also saw Japan occupy French Indochina, as Vichy France was now
ostensibly an ally. Tension between the US and Japan heightened, and
economic sanctions finally convinced Japan the only course open to
them was war. On 7 December 1941, the US naval base at Pearl Harbor was
bombed and the US declared war. Canada declared war on Japan also,
and Germany declared war on the United States. Canada had already
dispatched two battalions of troops to Hong Kong in November 1941, and
1,975 Canadians were killed or captured when the colony fell during
wide ranging Japanese offensives in December 1941.

German
intervention in Greece and Yugoslavia delayed Hitler's real goal of
conquering the Soviet Union. He launched his attack on 22 June 1941,
with Britain, and Canada, pledging to help the Soviet Union. Much
was given to the Soviets in the way of war materiel, being shipped
by sea in what came to be the Murmansk convoys. Canadian production
of war equipment, from web gear to tanks, was done with foreign
requirements in mind, including China and the USSR. The German
invasion forces failed to take Moscow, the capital, or Leningrad in
the north, and the onset of winter caused severe setbacks. As had
happened in Poland in 1939, the German Army was committed without
being fully prepared for the campaign logistically. Winter clothing
was not available to the troops in the Soviet Union in 1941, and the
declaration of war on Japan by the US meant that troops in Siberia
could be moved west to face the Germans outside Moscow. Despite
massive losses in men and equipment, the Soviet Union's Red Army
survived through the winter. As well, another campaign with Finland
began, which would last until 1944. In August 1941, Soviet troops
co-operated with British troops in occupying Persia (later Iran) to
secure both supplies of oil as well as maintain a southern supply
line into the Soviet Union. The British Army in North Africa fought
wide ranging actions back and forth across Libya and Egypt during
the year.

British POW taken in Greece.

1942

After the
Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor and the various declarations of war, by
early 1942, British possessions in the Pacific such as Singapore, Malaya,
Borneo and Burma had been invaded or surrendered to the Japanese, as had
US possessions such as the Philippine Islands. In June 1942, several
outposts in the Aleutian Islands were established by the Japanese, the
only invasion of North American soil to occur during the war. Canadian
soldiers would go there in 1943 to reclaim the islands along with US
forces, though the Japanese garrisons would have fled by then.

The spring
brought campaigning weather to the Eastern Front, where German forces
again made incredible gains in territory as their forces turned their
attention to the southern oil fields of the Caucasus. By now, five
Canadian divisions had been created and sent to Europe but had not yet
seen action. The controversial Dieppe Raid was scheduled for June 1942 and
launched on 19 August 1942. Demands for British and American action in Europe
were intense, both at home and from the Soviet Union who suffered great
losses again during the year.

High Water Marks

Axis fortunes changed during
the year; in the Pacific, a great naval victory at Midway in June 1942
shattered Japanese carrier forces, and the US took to the offensive in
August
with landings on Guadalcanal. Japan never regained the initiative, and the
US would continue the offensive, successfully invading island after island
in succession, including Tarawa (1943), Saipan (1944), the Philippines,
Iwo Jima, and Okinawa (1945). Fighting in China and Burma by major forces
of Chinese, British and US troops would also continue until 1945.

German forces in North Africa
were finally stopped by the British 8th Army at El Alamein, deep inside
Egypt. The commander of the 8th Army, General Bernard Law Montgomery, had
been known to the Canadians during his tenure as commander of South
Eastern Army in the United Kingdom; Montgomery had made many
recommendations to Canadian commanders there about training and employment
of individuals. The Germans were thrown into a headlong retreat, pushed
back to the Tunisian border. American and British landings in
north-western
Africa in November 1942 overwhelmed the Vichy French defenders, and US and
British forces took Tunisia in the first half of 1943, evicting the
Germans and Italians from North Africa for good. Many individuals of the
Canadian Army had a chance to gain battle experience by short postings to
British combat units in Tunisia, after which they returned to their
Canadian units.

In Russia, German territorial
gains reached their peak by September 1942, when resistance solidified in the
city of Stalingrad. Fighting there lasted until February 1943; the entire
German 6th Army was surrounded and destroyed by massive Soviet
counter-attacks.

1943

Even before the fall of Axis
forces in North Africa, the ongoing debate of where to attack the Germans
next had continued. American strategists had adopted the policy of
"Germany First", giving the war in the Pacific a lesser priority. The US
pushed for an immediate invasion of France as early as 1942. The British
managed to champion an indirect strategy, which resulted in the Italian
Campaign. On 10 July 1943, the US 7th Army and British 8th Army landed in
Sicily, with them went the 1st Canadian Infantry Division and later the
1st Armoured Brigade. As the campaign in Sicily wound down after 38 days,
in August 1943 Canadian and American soldiers landing in the Aleutian Islands
to reclaim territory lost in June 1942 when Japanese troops occupied Kiska
and Attu. Both the First Special Service Force and the 13th Canadian
Brigade took part in these operations.

On 25 July 1943 Mussolini was
removed from power by the King of Italy, and after Allied forces landed on
mainland Italy in September (including the 1st Canadian Division and 1st
Armoured Brigade), the Italian nation surrendered. German forces moved to
occupy the country and continued to resist the Allies. In December 1943, the
1st Division fought its first true divisional action on the Moro River,
culminating in the taking of Ortona, a battle considered a "miniature
Stalingrad" in the press. German forces created a series of defensive
lines, and Canadian forces (the 1st Division was joined by the 5th
Canadian (Armoured) Division in early 1944, coming under the command of I
Canadian Corps which also transferred to the Italian theatre) took part in
hard fighting in the Liri Valley, at the Hitler Line, the Gothic Line,
Coriano Ridge, the Savio and Senio rivers, as well as defensive actions in
two successive winters. Rome fell on 4 June 1944 after much hard fighting
both at Monte Cassino and the Anzio beachhead (where the First Special
Service Force saw much action). In February 1945, having helped liberate much
of Italy, the Canadian forces there were withdrawn to rejoin the First
Canadian Army in North-West Europe.

In the Soviet Union, attacks
and counter-attacks raged along the front after Stalingrad. Hitler ordered
a single massive and, he hoped, decisive attack on a salient near Kursk in
July 1943; the Soviet Union was well prepared for this battle, which became
the largest tank battle in history. The Germans suffered a major defeat.

1944

The campaign in North-West
Europe opened with the Normandy Landings on 6 June 1944, initially involving
the 3rd Canadian Infantry Division and 2nd Canadian Armoured Brigade.
British, Canadian and American forces opened a beachhead on the Continent
and despite strong German resistance, slowly widened their gains in June
and July. Progress on the Canadian front was extremely slow in the first
weeks, quickly settling into a stalemate in the face of strong German
armoured formations. Major operations in the Battle of Normandy were
costly, though every advance allowed more units into the congested
beachhead; the 2nd Canadian Infantry Division arrived in July 1944 and II
Canadian Corps headquarters became operational, followed in August 1944 by
4th Canadian (Armoured) Division and First Canadian Army headquarters -
the first (and only) Army-level headquarters in Canadian history. The
First Canadian Army served alongside the 2nd British Army under the 21st
Army Group commanded by General Montgomery.

German forces ordered to
characteristically counter-attack at Mortain created the conditions for a
large encirclement of the German 7th Army, and fighting to close the
Falaise Gap occupied much of August. By the end of the month, German forces
in Normandy had been destroyed, Paris had been liberated, and German
forces had been pushed beyond the Seine River. Canadian involvement in the
Normandy fighting has been the subject of much controversy since the end
of the war, not because the bravery of the Canadian Army was in doubt, but
because some historians have critically examined the training it received
beforehand, and the way it conducted operations once ashore.

In September 1944, as US and British
forces raced for the German border, First Canadian Army took over the left
flank of the Allied armies and set out to clear the Channel Ports as well
as eliminate the V-rocket launching sites. By this time, US forces
(including the First Special Service Force had landed in southern France
and quickly linked up with forces in northern France. A massive airborne
operation in September 1944 failed to secure a crossing across the Rhine River
and German retreats from France slowly came to a halt. While September 1944 had
also seen the liberation of Antwerp, the second largest port in Europe and
considered vital for shortening Allied supply lines, the waterway leading
into the port had unfortunately not been cleared of German coastal
fortifications, precipitating the month long, costly Battle of the Scheldt
which was a First Canadian Army responsibility.

In the Soviet Union, the siege
of Leningrad (the longest siege in history) was finally broken. Offensives
in Finland and central Russia shattered the Finns and Germans, causing the
former to sign an armistice. Army Group Centre was destroyed by the Soviet
Operation BAGRATION during the summer. Other Axis partners began to
defect; Romania switches sides in August 1944 and Bulgaria surrendered in
September
1944. Germany withdrew from the Balkans, though control of Hungary was
retained until February 1945.

1945

After the Battle of the Scheldt,
Canadian forces in North-West Europe settled into the Nijmegen Salient
(created after the abortive attempt to cross the Rhine River in September 1944).
The Canadians saw minor actions during this phase of the campaign, though
on 16 December 1944 the Germans launched the Ardennes Offensive, the last major
German offensive operation of the war in the west. After initial
successes, the offensive bogged down and by 1 January 1945 had been stopped
and in places pushed back. Canadian engineer units played a minor role in
British operations on the northern shoulder of the battle, dubbed "Battle
of the Bulge" by historians.

Allied leaders now looked to
the post-war world even as the First Canadian Army commenced its next
major operation, the clearing of the Rhineland, the last German positions
west of the Rhine River. The battle commenced in early February 1945 and lasted
until March. In the meantime, the "Big Three" of Prime Minister Winston
Churchill of the United Kingdom, Joseph Stalin of the Soviet Union and
President Franklin D. Roosevelt of the United States mapped out the
postwar world. The decision was made to leave large tracts of Eastern
Europe in Soviet hands, and that France would be one of the four occupying
powers in Germany after the war. The seeds of the Cold War were being sown
as Canadian operations ceased in the Rhineland and the Final Phase began.

With British and Canadian
soldiers fighting to clear northern Germany and The Netherlands in March and
April 1945, and US forces deep inside Germany and into Czechoslovakia, the
Red Army began the massive assault on Berlin. Adolf Hitler forbade any
Germany capitulation, and personally remained in the city until his
suicide on 30 April 1945. The city was taken at great cost to both sides.
German forces began to surrender unconditionally (one of the conditions
that had been agreed to among the Allies relatively early in the war) in
the first days of May, and Victory in Europe Day was officially declared 8
May 1945.

After the victory over Germany,
Canada created the Canadian Army Occupation Force, as well as the Canadian
Army Pacific Force, both in divisional strength. The CAOF remained on duty
in Germany until 1946, and the CAPF trained for the invasion of Japan, and
was quickly disbanded after the two atomic bombings in August 1945 and
eventual Japanese surrender on 2 September 1945.

War Crimes

While Canada had not declared
war on Germany specifically for moral principles, evidence on German
atrocities during the war mounted even if the scope of the Holocaust - the
systematic murder of at least 10,000,000 persons from throughout Europe,
including an estimated 6,000,000 persons defined as "Jewish" by the
Germans - was not known until the liberation of the concentration camps in
1945.

In the field, the Canadian Army
experienced the full expression of Nazi ideology when over 100 Canadian
prisoners of war were murdered in a series of incidents immediately after
the landing in Normandy. The 12th SS Panzer Division, named "Hitlerjugend"
after the young Nazi idealists who formed the bulk of the division's
personnel, fought a tooth and nail battle of no quarter in the opening
days of the campaign. Their divisional commander, Kurt Meyer, was tried
after the war and convicted for the crimes committed under his command. He
and his senior commanders had been brutalized by the war in the East,
ordered by Hitler from the very beginning to be considered a war of
annihilation between two races. In the wake of the German armies in the
Soviet Union had come the Einsatzgruppen (Special Action Groups) with
specific orders to exterminate every Jewish person they found. Under the
Nazis, institutional murder of homosexuals, Jews, gypsies, the elderly,
and the mentally insane all became public policy. While the 12th SS was
unique among a small number of units in bringing that attitude with them
to the Western Front, the German nation as a whole bore the responsibility
of introducing a new word - genocide - to the English language.

While Canada's morals may have
seemed at times no better than that of their enemies, such as the
imprisoning of Japanese-Canadians in internment camps after depriving them
of their rights and personal property, the Canadian Army maintained a
largely unblemished record as far as criminal acts. The official historian
noted in his autobiography that he only witnessed one incident that could
have been construed a warcrime, when the Argyll and Sutherland Highlanders
of Canada burned down private dwellings in Friesoythe, Germany as a
reprisal for the death of a popular Commanding Officer who had been
allegedly killed by a civilian. Other allegations include an accusation
regarding the shooting of prisoners at Leonforte by men of The Loyal
Edmonton Regiment.

Japanese misconduct during the
war was also a matter of record; millions of Chinese civilians perished,
some being subjected to medical experiments against their will. The
treatment of Allied prisoners of war was also atrocious, based largely on
the Japanese belief system that it was better to die than to surrender,
and that those who surrendered were dishonoured. Canadian wounded were
murdered in their beds when Hong Kong fell. Malnourishment of the
survivors was rife for the three and a half years they remained in
custody, 260 of whom died in captivity from the approximately 1700 who
survived the fighting in December 1941.

The War in Canada

Canada raised three divisions
for home defence during the Second World War, in addition to contributing
great quantities of materiel not just to its own forces but to its allies
also. Canadian industry proved itself equal to the challenges of a modern
war, and many items of Canadian war materiel, especially textiles, proved
to be superior to that of other nations.

Civilians faced new challenges
such as rationing and an increased role of women in the workplace. For the
first time, women were also permitted to serve directly in the armed
forces; the Canadian Women's Army Corps was a success, though it would be
twenty more years before women were directly integrated into the Armed
Forces in even a limited array of trades, and more years still before they
were permitted into combat roles. The Royal Canadian Navy and Royal
Canadian Air Force also had women's services, and there were a variety of
other roles for women to fulfil also, in civilian auxiliary organizations
and even as pilots ferrying combat aircraft to the United Kingdom. The
total number of women employed in just the Canadian Army would amount to
21,624 between 30 July 1941 and 8 May 1945, the majority in Canada. Women
enlistees in the three services amounted to over 45,000.

Aftermath

The Second World War led
directly to the Cold War. For the Canadian Army, the period immediately
after the war was naturally anti-climactic, though after the Korean War
the regular Army was expanded dramatically in size. The reserves would
find themselves with a diminished role due to nuclear detente in the
1960s, and Unification and major downsizing of Canadian forces would carry
the Canadian Army from the late 1960s into the 1970s and an uncertain
future. The rise of both the United States and the Soviet Union into
"superpowers" would leave the world in quiet fear of a third world-wide
conflict, possibly one in which nuclear weapons were to be widely used.

Top:
Friendship between Canadians
such as Gunner Brian O'Regan of the Canadian Film and Photo Unit,
pictured, and their Russian counterparts, was short-lived after the war.
Torgau, Germany, 27 April 1945. The war had resolved differences with old
enemies - and created entirely new ones. PAC 136330.

Bottom Left:
General Kurt Meyer of the
Waffen SS, who commanded the 12th SS Panzer Division in Normandy.
Convicted of war crimes after the war, his death sentence was commuted by
a Canadian general. The atrocities of the war paved the way to new systems
of international justice.

Bottom Right: This postcard from 1945 shows
the typical Service Dress of the Canadian Women's Army Corps. The war had
elevated the status of women in society just as the First World War
had.

Unlike the First World War, the
victors of the Second World War invested heavily in rebuilding the
defeated nations. West Germany and Japan especially were revitalized, and
the Soviet Union created satellite nations in Eastern Europe in their own
image. The war also provoked many former colonies throughout the world to
demand independence, which was sometimes granted peacefully, and sometimes
(as was the case in French Indochina) with prolonged military action.

As a direct result of the
Second World War, the United Nations were formed, and Canada would play a
major role in the development of this organization, and the rise of
peacekeeping forces.

Notes

In Britain,
the official histories of government policy and military action of the
three combatant services (Royal Navy, British Army, and Royal Air Force)
were combined into the HISTORY OF THE SECOND WORLD WAR, while in Canada,
the services (Royal Canadian Navy, Canadian Army, and Royal Canadian Air
Force) published separate histories, alongside studies of government
policy such as C.P. Stacey's Arms, Men and Government.
There is additional discussion of research and the official histories in
the RESEARCH section of this website.

Cooper, Matthew The German
Army 1933-1945: Its Political and Military Failure (Cooper and Lucas
Ltd, Briarcliff Manor, NY, 1978) ISBN 0812824687 pp.154-163